Disclaimer 1: This post won’t help you generate ideas. But if you have an idea it could help you validate its potential.

Disclaimer 2: I’m talking about venture-scale ideas. Topics discussed are almost irrelevant for SME and life-style businesses.

Our friend Marcin recently took my wife and me on a small plane flight in Austin, with him as a pilot. Before the take-off we went through the “flight-readiness” checklist. It made me think about other high-stakes decisions we make in life where our decision-making process could benefit from a checklist.

The selection of an entrepreneurial idea to commit to feels like one of such decisions. I wish there is a simple checklist that a founder can go through before committing years of intense focus to an idea.